


psychedelic canvas

by Anonymous



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: F/M, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-20
Updated: 2020-06-20
Packaged: 2021-03-03 19:47:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24821062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: The night before the final battle, Sora comes to a realization.
Relationships: Kairi/Sora (Kingdom Hearts)
Kudos: 20
Collections: Anonymous





	psychedelic canvas

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sokaicore](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sokaicore/gifts).



> title is/work is inspired by cuco's [lover is a day](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wiEM0s4aCQ)

_Let me protect you this time._ Kairi had said when it was just the two of them facing Destiny's dying light, with a paopu fruit hanging off her hand. 

A dangling commitment in the most literal terms, Sora realized. One she had offered with not a single hitch or hesitation spotted. Sephie's words from so long ago echo his ears, talks of hearts and love. To alligate their souls together and never be apart again— a promise too good to be true. 

With the sweet taste of fruit, Sora knows it will become true. Sora will make sure it does. 

Later Kairi will laugh and say, "Reminds me when you went off to get Riku. Remember? You told me it would be too dangerous for me." 

He could never forget anything about her— not truly. Sora remembers too much of her; how he used to keep her coat at his house so she can come back to get it later, her getting their favorite food and waiting for him to eat it together. The notes she would pass him in class, chastising him for sleeping. He rubs the back of his neck and hopes the heat of his face is from an impending sunburn. "And to think we'll be here… I'm sorry for not trusting you enough back then." 

Kairi knocks her feet against his, before catching and holding it between hers. "Don't apologize, silly. I understand, even if I had fought tooth and nail." She rocks their feet. "Don't dwell on it too much. What matters now is that we protect each other now, right?" 

A strong surge of emotions rushes through him, so overwhelming it's drowning. "Yes!" He says too loudly but too happy to care. 

They protect each other now— a promise etched into their souls. 

\- 

It's later after they had separated for the night when Sephie's words truly sink in. 

_It's so romantic!_ She had swooned, eyes glazed over and stuck in her daydreams too much. _It's almost as if love had made it!_ She always had these ideas of true love and happy endings. Riku had once teased her about them. It was before they had been swept away by the darkness, but she had been so caught up in her head she didn't hear. 

Riku had always teased too much— his toss of the paopu was the first time he had ever felt the rough texture of it. It was not a bad pick as Kairi's was also so rough against his hands. It felt so out of place, almost as if the stories lied about the reality of the paopu fruit. He thought that if this was made of love, his and Kairi's, why was it rough? 

Was this love? Was this how it felt to be in love? 

He doesn't know his heart, despite how much faith he puts into it. Meeting everyone— Rapunzel and Eugene, William and Elizabeth —had only proven his lackluster knowledge. Their bonds had burned so brightly that Sora couldn't help himself but be fascinated by it at every turn. They had so much heart— so much so that they had to give it to someone else. 

Was that what love was? 

Kairi calls him hours after the sun sets: _"Can you come over? To bring the necklace you had gotten for me from Corona?"_ He was out of his house before she had even finished her sentence. It only was until he was climbing up to her window that he began to question why she would need it now. 

Her window was already open for him, her sitting in the worn-down loveseat right under. Her room was only lit up by the dull lamp at her bedside. Sora climbs down to the couch, still wearing his sleepwear. 

"Sorry for calling you so late…" Kairi says, visibly embarrassed. "I couldn't sleep, so I thought— um." She fidgets and pushes some hair behind her ear. 

"It's fine. I was awake when you called anyways," Sora waves away while handing her the gift and sinks into the lumpy seat. 

The necklace itself isn't something to write home to. It's a cheap chain; the centerpiece is too big to really wear right— a gift elitists would no doubt vilipend. But the design of two stars falling together, tiny blue jewels encrusted into its outline, had won the market person Sora's munny. 

_Sorry for wearing your present but look!!_ Sora had sent with a photo of him smiling with the necklace wrapped around his throat. A few minutes later he sent again, _And sorry for spoiling it..._

"You were right, it really does look like our drawing." Kairi inspects the necklace, twisting its chain around her fingers. "It's perfect." 

Her face is so soft in the dull lighting, Sora notices with a twist in his heart. Her round face and acne scars endearing to an unfair degree. He wants to ask her if she's okay now, but if she had gotten what she wanted and she wouldn't need him anymore. And he doesn't need to stay in her room, that's unrecognizable to the one they played together in when they were younger, any longer. 

He isn't surprised that he doesn't want to leave. But he's surprised at how much his body hurts ( _aches_ ) at the thought of leaving. 

"Hey, Sora…" She looks more intensely at the necklace, worrying at her bottom lip. "Can you… stay?" 

"Huh?" Sora squeaks out immediately. "I mean— Of course, Kairi! But is... everything alright?" 

She rocks in her seat, rubbing her hands on her thighs. "I'm fine." She promises, grabbing his hand and looking up at him. "Come on, we can share the bed like we used to." 

Kairi had always loved to cuddle. But more importantly, she had always loved to be cuddled; she never complains when she wakes up in his suffocating hold. But when he goes to wrap his arms around her, she grabs his arm. 

"What's wrong?" Sora asks. His mind immediately goes to the worst, a dug-in reflex, that she's hurt or that he had done something wrong to her. But Kairi shakes her head at his concerned face. 

"Can I try being the big spoon this time?" 

They rearrange with Kairi's arms wrapped around his waist and head pillowed between his neck and shoulder. There was little noise to be heard, with the only exception of an insect's stridulates. His over sensitive skin feels her warm breaths against his neck, breathing in and out softly. And the drips of water dripping onto his hairline. 

"Kairi?" He tries to turn around to face her, but Kairi locks in her arms. There's no room for him to turn his head around. He goes to touch her face with his hand blindly but is only able to find her hair. He strokes it gently. "What's wrong, Kai?" 

Her hands grab ahold of his sleepshirt, twisting it and digs her knuckles into his stomach like she's trying to find some ground _anywhere_. "I k-keep feeling so _bad_ ," she chokes out, pushes away and presses her forehead into his shoulder, and sucks in her next breath, "Like everything— _everything_ keeps pushing me a-away from everyone else." 

He runs her hair through his fingertips, eventually reaching her bangs and her hairline. Runs his hand through once more before letting rest in it, her hair pushed away from her face. "Hey, remember today? I can promise you I'm not going anywhere." 

"What if it isn't enough— what if you're still taken away from me?" Kairi cries harder, soaking his shirt's shoulder. 

_What if, what if, what if—_

When Sora came back to Destiny Islands after his fight with Xenmas, he woke to nights with dreams of his island being eaten away by the darkness. He stayed up afraid his friends were leaving him behind, and he was powerless to stop it from happening. It's a soul-eating fear that is insatiable, despite his best attempts at taming it. His childhood dreams of what-ifs became someone completely different from him— no longer were they ideas of island hopping and friendship but possibilities he couldn't stop and a future he can't control. 

What could he tell her when he had doubts himself? How could he console her when he can barely console himself? 

"I'll promise you this, Kai," Sora says with such conviction that he feels that he can believe in it also. "We'll always find each other, no matter what. We're bonded now, forever. Nothing can break that, not even darkness." 

He turns his head, his body still locked in her arms. "Okay?" 

She's plaintively quiet for a few moments, sniffling into his shirt and stiff. It takes a few more whispered reassures till she breathes out, relaxes her shoulders and arms, and says in a thick voice, "Okay." 

He turns slowly in her arms, "Yeah. We'll be okay, you'll see. Everything will be okay soon." 

Her face is red and wet. Her eyes are puffy and warm under Sora's touch as he wipes away her tears. Kairi grabs his hand and holds it, pressing it against her face, breathing in deep and slow. 

He lays there for minutes, watching her calm herself down, too worried to move. He focuses on her celestial necklace laid across her bedside when she curls up against him. Even with the choked up emotions in his own throat, he cannot deny the warmth settling in his skin and heart. The warmness of the night's promises wraps around his body and their tied soul. 

He had always known the trust was there, but seeing it in action, her trusting him enough to cry in front of him, overrides his brain with something akin to joy. 

"Okay, now?" He whispers when she pushes her head further into his chest. 

She nods and pulls him close. Sora lets her, wrapping his arms around her shoulders, pillowing her head. 

"You know how I asked you for the necklace?" She asks, voice quiet and muffled. He nods. "I... actually just wanted you here." 

His next breath is hard to take. A feeling comes to him so overwhelmingly that he can't function. 

Sora doesn't know everything about the heart. He doesn't understand the intricacies and intimacy of giving away your heart when he's only been sharing it for so long. Sora doesn't know if he can give it away when Sora's split into so many different people that he doesn't know. 

He doesn't know everything about the heart, especially when it comes to his— but Kairi was there inside him. Would she know? If he asks, will Kairi be able to tell him this is love he felt? Can he ask if when she gave him that fruit with no doubt visible, was she so sure that what she felt was love? 

It would be so easy to ask: _Is this love?_ But it's simultaneously so daunting to confirm. To hear her acknowledge his heart and what was there— to be seen. The thought makes him feel like his heart is already bare and open for her to see. Whole once again but entirely within his awareness now. 

Why must it be so overwhelming to be in love. 

It's not a game about trust, this, but one about him and his feelings and whether or not he's ready to feel her heart full force. It's about his strength and his willingness to love her. If he can face her with these feelings every morning when he wakes, again, and again. Allowing her to take another part of his heart while accepting another part of hers. A constant cycle of balancing each other, supporting the other when they can't take their weight any longer. 

The answer is so clear to him that he can't even ask it but only trust that she understands without him having to ask. That his love sends clear without error. 

With a pounding heart, he presses his lips against her forehead and lets the warmth of her light wrap him whole and without doubts of misconception. 


End file.
